July 20, 2010

Sky HD channels confirmed (official)

Official press release:Virgin Media today announced the addition of Sky Sports HD1 and Sky Sports HD2 for the very first time to its rapidly growing line-up of HD channels, bringing its customers the best of sport in crystal clear high definition. Featuring Premier League Football, Cricket and Rugby Union amongst a wide range of other popular sports, Sky Sports HD1 and HD2 will join ESPN HD, EuroSport HD, BBC HD and ITV1 HD giving Virgin Media customers a diverse and compelling range of HD sports to enjoy.

The new Sky Sports HD channels will be available from August 2nd and will cost just £7 per month on any TV package when subscribing to Sky Sports in standard definition. The optional HD subscription covers all available HD versions of subscribed Sky Premiums including Sky Sports HD1 and HD2 and ten Sky Movies HD channels, though high definition versions of standard channels (such as BBC, ITV1, FX, Eurosport and SyFy) remain free of additional subscription costs, giving customers a simple upgrade path to take advantage of HD content as they choose.

The addition of Sky Sports HD1 and HD2 follows Virgin Media’s deal with Sky to bring its customers a wide range of new HD channels and Red Button interactive services*. The deal also adds Sky 1HD, Sky Arts HD** and Sky Movies HD channels for the very first time, which will take the total number of HD channels on Virgin Media to 30.

Cindy Rose, executive director of digital entertainment said: “As the new home of HD telly, we’re delighted to bring our customers Sky Sports in HD at incredibly competitive rates. With the rapid growth of HD content, customers are demanding more and more from their TV service, and with our growing range of HD channels and on demand content in HD, Virgin Media is the best place for the whole families’ entertainment needs.”

Notes

All Virgin Media’s HD channels are available to all customers with an HD ready TV with either a V HD or V+ HD set top box enabled for HD. * Details of Red Button interactive services from Sky will be announced in due course. ** Timing for Sky 1HD and other Sky Basic channel launches in HD will be confirmed in due course

Prices correct at time of press, and based on stated online pricing in effect on August 1st, excluding introductory period discounts. All prices assume paying by direct debit and opting for paper-free billing. With Sky, you can add UK evening and weekend calls and up to 20Mb broadband with 2 GB usage (depending on location) to your package for no extra charge. For Unlimited Sky Broadband, add £7.50.Virgin Media prices include unlimited UK weekend calls. For Virgin Media unlimited UK evening and weekend calls add £3.45 a month. Virgin Media broadband packages start at £12.50 a month for up to 10Mb. The average performance of Virgin Media’s up to 10Mb service is comparable to ADSL2+ services at up to 16Mb and more. UK calls = numbers starting 01, 02 and 03.

Just wondering what the situation is for VIP subscribers. I heard rumours that we were going to get the premium HD at no extra cost (considering they take £130 per month from me anyway).Anyone able to shed some light?

I have just called Virgin and told them I am very disappointed at the £7 pm surcharge as:1 - I already pay £20.50 for Sports2 - I don't get Movies, a dozen channels, but its a flat fee for just two sports channels3 - I can only record 20 hours of HD on my V+ box, so I can't justify spending more for more HD as I will have nowhere to keep it till I can watch it (I timeshift the majority of my TV viewing these days). Coverage of a sngle footie game could be 10% of the disk, and it will never cope with a few days cricket!!!!I think the only hope to stop this rip off is for more people to tell VM "No". Best to actually call them, but please don't rush to accept this deal as it will change if take up is poor.

But I believe Virgin HAVE to charge, the only way Sky would let them have the premium channels was if Virgin charged for them (this is my understanding from reading this site) - they don't have an option not to charge...but I do wonder if you complain that they might give you a £7 refund pm?

I agree about the HDD size, I was surprised that the new box I got had the same HDD size and there's no easy way to upgrade.

virgin are trying a crafty way round this now. Just phoned them as ive waited ages in the hope of getting ss3 in HD which im not going to get as i like watching wwe (ok no jokes please) so i thought ok over to sky as they can offer me the same deal at the same price as virgin plus more now back in jan 2010 i upgraded my internet connection with virgin and was told 3 times that the 12 month contract would only be with the broadband and not any of the other servives, Now they tell me on the phone that the new contract for 12 months was for all services and that they sent out a letter stating this which is aload of s**t and if i want to leave i got to pay £261.

@baw, how many times do we have to go through this? If you had sky you'd be paying the £10pm anyway, so it's £3pm cheaper and you get ESPN HD instead of 3&4.

@aaron, there's nothing crafty - it's a new contract, ask them to resend the letter.

I give up tho, really. I don't get how people are complaining - if you add it all up Virgin is cheaper and you miss out on a few channels that few are interested in...I can understand aaron being a bit upset as he has a specific need - but for the majority who want to watch premier league footy it's a good deal (what with ESPN being free to XL)

Why are people STILL moaning about having to subscribe to the SD packages??? It seems people want them for just £7??? HD obviously is a higher charge. Perhaps Virgin shouldn't have offered any free HD and then everyone would have thought it was a bargain! If you don't subscribe to Sports and Movies anyway, why bother whinging about having to pay a bit more to get them in HD???

(a) For £7 I am only getting 2 channels in HD that I am already paying £20.50 for.(b) The disk is so small from a practical view point I would only really be able to watch these two channels live.

This is very poor value for money. £2 extra pm for SS1/2 in HD I might have put up with. The flat fee is clearly taking the michael.[John W - There are two John's on this tread. I osted with points 1/2/3, the early John posts are not me]

I am on VIP with and extra V+ box and have just done a price comparison with Sky and prices are very close, so I don't think Virgin are as competitive as they were when I joined last August. Yes the broadbannd is good and the catchup TV is a favourite of mine, but the STB's are still fairly clunky(samsungs) and I have had 3 major outages in the year and the response times are shocking.

@jwspurs, I managed to get a new box which is lovely and small & much quieter - I've also had some outages but got some good refunds whilst I wait. On top of this I got a new remote and a free wifi router - and included in the price is all the repairs and call-out fees...when your sky box goes down, get out the cheque book!

@dan, I think it is fairly safe to assume sky 1 HD will be free (when it arrives), and if you had to pay £7pm for it you would not get sports unless you paid the extra £20pm (or whatever it is) for SD version

@gst2000 well it is abit crafty as i know they never said that on the phone to me, But on a better note just spoke to them again and have managed to get a second vHD box for upstaires at no cost (should have been £49) and they are going to charge the £7 a month for both boxes i have but put a discount of £10 amonth on the bill which i think they are deducting from my broadband.

i dont mean to sound nitpicky but its not that bad when you look at it i mean 8 months ago we had no HD now we have got all this with the hope that more will come soon and if you break it down its only another 23p a day to add hd sports and movies over the course of a month.

If I'm reading this correctly, if you subscribe to just a single Sky Sports channel you can get that channel in HD for £7 extra, but if you subscribe to the Sky Sports Collection you get both SS1&2 in HD for the same £7?

My son is a big cricket fan, but away on a school trip next week. He wants to watch the Twenty20 quarter finals (&semis...). If they were in HD they would fill 65% of my V+ disk on there own (in two days). This is why £7 pm is a TOTAL RIP OFF."Oh things are so much better"Like most people I'm working harder for less money. VM trying to con £7 pm for two HD sports channel is just not in keeping with the current economy.John W

Some of the responses to this post beggar belief. It is Sky that has set the price, not Virgin. Virgin will not make any profit on selling these. The HD versions are optional - if you are not prepared to pay, don't pay. Don't moan on and on about it. At least we have a choice now. I, for one, am delighted to have the movie channels and sport available in HD. That it works out cheaper than Sky's HD offering is a bonus.Sure, free would have been unbelievable, but that's not what Sky has dictated.

@john... theres not much you can do about the size of the v+ box hard drive when that box first came out virgin wernt even close to getting any hd content from sky and the £7 a month that they are charging has nothing to do with the v+ box hard drive size at all if you want to record long programes dont do it in hd is the easy answer or wait till october time when the new tiVo box comes out which is rumored to have a 1tb hard drive.

@Aaron - The V+ drive was way too small before we had HD. I'm having to housekeep the disk clean and cull my SD series records just for when I go on holiday. VM could have supported an external disk, but decided not to.

OT Just had 2 hours on to tech (lack of) support for the car crash that is PC Guard, that's the "security software" that turns it self off!!!! very less than happy with the shambles that is VM.

Of course I have the choice not to pay the HD poll tax - and that's what I'm going to do.

well have virgin said its sky that told them to charge us all the £7 i dont think so. virgin have never come out and said that ? but we have now got 2 pay or dont get the hd sports or movies can people on ere tell me what the best offers they have got from vm since this charge i want all 3 i pay now £55.44 for 10meg broadband tv xl and xl phone but will put it up 2 £89.94 if i get sports and movies in hd has any 1 get a deal (money off) on the phone with them thanks daz

"Of course, if Virgin increases the number of subscribers to the Movies and Sports channels they'll be hitting a bigger base when launching the HD channels in the coming weeks, but it seems like us poor VIPs are paying a premium these days and the overall VIP package has changed little since the launch of the V+. Certainly, the 20mb broadband is no longer the "VIP" offer it once was, the phone price has actually increased and we now get Sports and Movies for the same price as everyone else. Or am I missing something?"

What I expected when we didn't receive a discount at this time was for HD channels to come for free.

"Sure, free would have been unbelievable, but that's not what Sky has dictated."

Now yes Sky do set the price for the HD content, but there is nothing to stop them from reducing the price of the respective Sport & Movie packages when taking out the £7 HD upgrade - this would address John's concern of only getting 2 channels for his £7.

I am also a top end user, 3 STB inc VIP and I will absolutely not be paying £7/£14 for HD content unless the overall price for Movies & Sports is reduced in line with the reductions that others got earlier this year.

Sky have set the price.Ofcom didn't set a price for HD, they agreed with Sky that it was a developing market and that setting a set price on it could prevent future innovation. Instead they ruled it must be offered on "fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory basis" In the third draft of thereview they proposed £5.89 + VAT, but then decided not to implement any fixed pricing. It would be fair to guess that Sky have charged at least that.

@Ro-me-ro: VIP doesn't feel as good a value as it did when it launched, but I think Virgin's hands have been tied with Sky HD channels. I'd like 50mb broadband as a VIP customer, and a greater capacity on my V+, and TiVo at no extra charge - all of which may be next. Call me optimistic...

@Nialli: no it doesn't does it. Infact recently all we have had is price increases, whereas lower spend non VIP customers have had price reductions.

Whilst VM might attract some new customers doing this, they probably are going to be shelling out alot more in retentions as a result...

talking of which @jwspurs since you have been back at Virgin almost a year, call 150 and select that you are thinking about leaving and discuss this with a CSR - they almost certainly will offer you a discount to sign another 1 yr contract if you quote the figures to them.

My current deal is £90.94 for VIP with an extra V+ box (3 boxes in total - the V box keeps the kids quiet!).

To be honest though, it annoys me that the policy with VM is to only grease the squeaky wheel -- I'd rather not have to ask.

It's disappointing they couldn't come to an agreement about SS3HD and SS4HD, and the implementation of the £7 premium HD fee is a bit unfortunate, but for anyone keeping score at home, this latest batch of HD channels puts VM ahead of Sky.

The simple fact is Sky have completely mugged off VM. They now have all of VM's channels in an extremely good deal, are the only broadcasters to offer all Sky Sports in HD and have left VM XL/VIP customers fuming that they have no reduction in the price for Sky Sports and have to pay £7 per box for two measley HD sports channels (assuming they, like me dont care about movies)And after working it out Sky are now CHEAPER if you want Sky Sports in HD plus the bonus of far more HD channels. A real shame.

Where did the wholesale discount go? I am an XL customer, we received no benefit from the wholesale discount imposed on Sky. I along with many others assumed this was being held back to absorb the cost of the HD channels. Instead Virgin have decided to keep the whole of the wholesale discount for themselves. As a customer one can only assume that they don't want our business.

@Christian. Those on TV M+-L now pay less for the Sky Sports SD subscription. Us suckers on XL/VIP pay the same as before. I rang up VM and asked to be downgraded to M+ and was told I would lose my loyalty bonus, a bonus I've built up for untold years since Telewest started! I've only been a VM XL customer for 8 months! VM have been nothing short of a disgrace.

When I spoke to an advisor he didn't know anything about Premium rate HD channels, but read the stuff of the web sight about £7 pm Premium flat rate. I said £3.50 a channel on top of the £20.50 I already pay was too much. There wasn't a lot he could say as all he knew he'd just read off the web...... if an advisor has told you anything different get it in writing :-)

So if I want these new HD Sky premium channels, I have to first subsribe to SD Sky Sports 1 and 2 - £20.50 per month, plus an extra £7.

So an extra £27.50 per month.

Seems a little excessive to me plus a little missleading, i.e. VM advertising is making a big statement about new Sky HD channels being £7 per month while a small statement says you must perchase SD Sky SPorts 1 and 2 without quoting a price.